The History Lesson We Skip: Who the Story of Thanksgiving Left Behind

For generations, the American Thanksgiving story has been a cozy, predictable tableau: brave Pilgrims, friendly, generic “Indians,” and a harmonious, cornucopia-laden feast. It’s the narrative that makes a good school pageant, but as historians remind us, the version we grew up with is more of a national myth than a full account of the events at Plymouth Colony in 1621. The popular image, cemented by artists and writers centuries later, centered the story on the English settlers, effectively pushing the Indigenous people to the margins of their own history.

The group most often overlooked is the Wampanoag, the Indigenous people whose land the Pilgrims settled on. Their name, fittingly, means “People of the First Light.” When the Pilgrims arrived in 1620, they landed in a ghost town, a Wampanoag village called Patuxet that had been decimated by a European-borne epidemic just a few years earlier. The Wampanoag population had been tragically reduced, leaving their leader, Ousamequin, known as Massasoit, in a precarious strategic position against rival tribes like the Narragansetts.

This critical geopolitical context is what led to the famous alliance. Ousamequin saw the English colonists, despite their recent arrival, as a potential military partner to help fend off his rivals, not simply as friends to welcome to a new world. The Wampanoag were vital to the Pilgrims’ survival, sharing life-saving knowledge about planting native crops and fishing in the new environment.

The harvest celebration that year was a three-day event by the Pilgrims, not a pre-planned inter-cultural dinner party. According to a primary source, the Wampanoag were only drawn to the settlement after hearing the Pilgrims fire their weapons during a “display of arms,” mistaking it for an attack. Massasoit arrived with 90 men and, finding no conflict, decided to join the festivities. In a moment of genuine hospitality that saved the event, they went out and brought back five deer to share, as the colonists were not prepared to feed so many extra guests.

Sadly, this initial peace was fleeting. Within a generation, increasing colonial expansion and land disputes erupted into King Philip’s War, a devastating conflict that ultimately led to the Wampanoag losing their political independence and much of their ancestral territory.

Today, the complicated legacy of that first harvest celebration finds expression in a powerful modern tradition. Every Thanksgiving Day, hundreds of Indigenous people and their allies gather on Cole’s Hill in Plymouth, Massachusetts, for the National Day of Mourning. Started in 1970 after a Wampanoag elder named Wamsutta (Frank) James was prevented from giving a speech deemed too critical of the historical narrative, the annual demonstration is a solemn, spiritual day. It serves as a necessary protest and a reminder that for many Native Americans, the holiday is a painful symbol of the genocide, land theft, and cultural erasure that followed colonization.

While the country pauses for turkey and gratitude, the National Day of Mourning asks us to broaden our focus, reflecting on the profound losses endured by the Wampanoag and other tribes, and honoring their enduring strength and resistance. It is a powerful call to remember that true American history requires acknowledging all of the voices history has tried to leave behind.